Unreal â??the unofficial engine of Natalâ??

Epic Games VP Mark Rein has declared that Unreal 3 is the “unofficial engine” for Natal development.

Rein confirmed that Microsoft’s first batch of Natal demos – shown back at E3 in June – were powered by Unreal Engine tech, but were not developed by Epic Games.

“So obviously Microsoft has a new studio that is making games for Natal, and it's using Unreal Engine 3,” said Rein, speaking to OXM.

“The great part of all this is that it has extended the engine to do the mapping of Avatars, the animation system - all the good stuff that's there.”

Rein added: “So the nice thing is, we are going to work with Microsoft to make that available to Unreal Engine licensees who want to make Natal games.

“So, if you want to make a game on Natal, you want to get a big head-start and use the same tech as Microsoft, come talk to me.

“We are the unofficial engine of Natal, or maybe the official, I don't know. In other words, we consider ourselves the ‘economic engine of Natal’. You want to make money with Natal, come talk to us, we'll help you.”

Rein was philosophical when asked if developers would hit challenges in using Unreal Engine 3 for Natal development.

“Making games is never easy,” he said. “I always hesitate to say something is easy, because I'm not the one who's doing the work. But they did it in a very short period of time, the results are spectacular, they are very happy with the tech, and they are very happy working with us to find other developers who could make really great experiences with Natal.”